


Jealous

by missigma



Category: DCU
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Internalized Homophobia, Jealousy, M/M, They're terrible at talking to each other, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-16
Packaged: 2018-11-20 10:42:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11334114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missigma/pseuds/missigma
Summary: After stumbling across one of Bruce Wayne's intimate encounters, Clark grapples with what it means to be jealous of a man who has had Bruce in a way he has not.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally intended to be my Superbat Big Bang fic, but I ended up getting frustrated with it and writing something else (despite a lot of very helpful suggestions from the SBB writer's room). 
> 
> However, it would have been a shame to not post it after I spent so much time working on it, so I've done my best to clean it up. This is the result.

Clark was straight.

 He knew this with an unflinching certainty, though he had never found cause to examine his sexuality. To him, everything had always been clear. He dated women, slept with women, fell in love with women, therefore, he was straight. Never in his life had there been a single moment where he had second guessed his own heterosexuality.

 Except, perhaps, this moment.

 Two stories above, in the south stairwell, Bruce Wayne was having sex and Clark found himself unable to look away.

 “Having sex,” as explicit as it might sound, still seemed too gentle a description. Too vague and detached. Because, really, it wasn't the fact that he had managed to catch Bruce having sex that shocked Clark. Instead, it was the act itself, or at least his choice of partner.

Two stories above, in the south stairwell, a man was fucking Bruce Wayne against the wall. Though Clark now had been watching for at least five minutes, his initial surprise still stubbornly refused to subside.

The man was no one Clark recognized, no one he had ever seen before. He was tall and burly in a way that even Bruce's broad shoulders could not manage. As he stared at him, Clark could not fathom what it was about him that Bruce found attractive, or why it was _him_ Bruce had chosen to do _this_.

 At some point earlier in the night, when he had been making the rounds at the charity banquet, Bruce had been wearing a tuxedo. Presently, most of his clothes lay around his feet. A tangle of his slacks, belt and underwear twisted around his ankles, hobbling him. His shirttails were hiked up and cast to the side, leaving a good view of his ass.

 From this angle, Clark could see them both in profile. He could match every quick inhale from Bruce with a thrust of the man's hips. He could watch Bruce ball his hands into his fists whenever he took the entire length inside him.

 There was nothing tender about the act. Very little of what Clark could see matched the way he thought about sex at all. The pace that the man set was merciless, his grip bruising. And yet, Bruce was getting off on this.

 As Clark watched, Bruce arched his back and pushed back into the other man, impaling himself even deeper on his cock. Groaning, Bruce put his hand to himself, murmuring an encouragement.

 The man hunched forwards and whispered something vile in his ear. Panting, Bruce tilted his head back, an expression painfully close to a smile on his lips. As the man grinned back, he brought his hand down with a loud smack across Bruce's ass.

He then pulled out so suddenly that Bruce yelped. Head down, Bruce waited as the man squeezed at his ass and spread him open, before spitting on his hole. Then, roughly, he thrust back in all at once, nearly bringing Bruce to his knees.

Clark ducked his head, guilt suddenly rushing in to replace his initial shock. He knew he shouldn't watch. Bruce was his friend, and he certainly wouldn't appreciate Clark violating his privacy like this, regardless of his _almost_ public choice of venue.

 Even without looking, Clark could still hear Bruce's sharp gasps as the man pounded into him under the murmur of the crowd. When he dared to glance up again, Bruce's hair had fallen into his eyes. He worked quickly at his cock, moaning, long and low.

It had been a pained cry that had first drawn Clark's attention. He knew Bruce's voice anywhere, knew the sound of his heart, of his breathing. At that sound, Clark had already been on his feet, ready to rush to his side.

Then he had looked up, through walls and rafters, and had found Bruce entwined with that other man.

Now the man came, grunting loudly. He thrust shallowly into Bruce, before burying himself inside him one final time. Bruce followed moments later, shuddering and collapsing forwards onto his knees.

With his forehead pressed against cinderblock, Bruce's breathing gradually began to slow. He shifted in place, his shirttails sliding down to cover his fucked open ass.

Tilting Bruce's head back by his hair, the man easily slid his cock into his mouth. He set a leisurely pace with his hand as Bruce licked and sucked the taste of himself off the condom. For close to a minute, they remained like that, with Bruce obediently lapping at his fading erection.

Pushing Bruce back, the man disentangled himself from him. Bruce remained on his knees as the man retreated, still breathing heavily.

Clark found himself glaring after the other man as he descended the stairs, analyzing him. He was several years older than Bruce and well-dressed, though his suit was not well-tailored. The inseam of his trousers was too long and a stray thread hung from his right sleeve. Hand-me-downs, if he had to guess.

 That little detail should intrigue him. Surely, there was a story behind this man, something that Clark could not see just by looking at him. There must be something more that he did not understand that made him desirable to Bruce.

 With an intensity that surprised him, Clark was glad that the man had left. However, it was not purely for the fact that he wanted to avoid the awkwardness of having to make conversation with Bruce's most recent sex partner. No, he found himself genuinely annoyed by a man he had never met.

 He was not quite so lucky with Bruce. Clark had half-hoped that he would make a similar exit, his goals for the evening accomplished. Instead, he saw Bruce emerge on the upper balcony half an hour later. From his perch above the crowd, Bruce immediately picked him out, icy eyes intent.

 Frowning, Clark watched as Bruce made a beeline for his table. Bruce had at least freshened up in the time since Clark had last caught sight of him. He was dressed neatly, all his clothes smoothed free of the wrinkles they had gathered on the floor. His cheeks bore none of the flush of sex, just a wide, bland grin.

 Clark wasn't sure what he had been expecting. Bruce Wayne was only a mask, after all. Masks were easily replaced.

 "Still need a quote?" Bruce rested his hand on the tabletop, leaning amicably towards Clark. "I'm heading out, but we could share a ride."

It was an innocent invitation to talk. If anything, it was as close to an apology as Clark was going to get. Even more, it was an opportunity to move on, to pretend he had seen nothing. Clark wondered if Bruce had already guessed that he had overheard.

Clark looked down at the table, running his tongue along the backs of his teeth. The outside of Bruce's hand was scraped raw. Unhelpfully, Clark's mind supplied the image of Bruce's fists pressed against cinderblock.

"No," Clark snapped, then swallowed, a little surprised by his own sharpness. He barely dared to meet Bruce's gaze.

Bruce withdrew his hand, his eyes narrowed. "Something wrong, Kent?"

“Sorry.” Clark rose, jolting the table in his haste. Belatedly, he realized he should have left earlier to prevent this encounter from ever happening. "I don't have time to talk. I have a plane to catch."

 ****

An hour and a few hundred miles away, Clark slouched on the roof of his apartment building, his feet hanging over the edge. He shook his head as he replayed the moment, cursing himself for his transparency. If he hadn't guessed already, Bruce would soon realize something was wrong. If Bruce knew he was upset, he would find out why.

The idea of that looming, awkward confrontation with Bruce weighed on him, but it was not the only thing that troubled him about tonight.

Reluctantly, Clark dug deeper, questioning why exactly he was so upset about seeing Bruce like that. He didn't understand what it was that made it sting to see Bruce with another man. There was nothing in their friendship that gave him any right to be angry about something like this.

As infuriating as it was to realize that Bruce had apparently found his sex life more important than Clark tonight, that was not what continued to nag at him. No, as much as he wanted to deny it, what truly affected him was the revelation that Bruce slept with men.

Perhaps, Clark thought, he was only acting like this because he was surprised. Bruce had always projected an image of being a straight bachelor. He always dated women, as many a gossip column would attest.

But Bruce Wayne was a mask.

For all the open-mouthed kisses, wandering touches and smirking innuendoes Clark had watched Bruce deliver, he had never seen Bruce go any further than that.

After all, Clark was in the uniquely embarrassing position to be aware of such things. His senses had often landed him in similarly awkward situations with his other friends, but that had never happened with Bruce. Previously, Clark hadn't bothered to give that much thought. He had simply assumed that there was a simple answer, such as that Bruce was discreet and politely aware of the range of Clark's hearing.

Now, Clark was confronted by a different solution. What if Bruce had been hiding his real relationships from everyone, including him?

Frowning, Clark tried to dismiss the theory. He was acting like a teenager.

Like he was jealous.

Clark snorted at the very idea. Jealous of what?

 ****

For a week, Clark refused to interrogate that thought. He avoided Bruce where he could, making sure that they were never alone together, that Bruce never had a chance to confront him.

But then, Clark came upon one of those puzzles where he could not force all the pieces together. Try as he might, there were times he could not keep everyone safe, where he couldn't prevent every tragedy. Tonight, he saw red.

Often on nights like these, Clark would visit Bruce. They would rarely talk about what was troubling him. Still, Clark found his presence grounding. In the time he had known him, Bruce never seemed to change. Clark was intimately familiar with his personality, which buttons he could push without taking things too far. Despite Bruce's best efforts, he had grown comfortable with him.

He did not want any of that comforting sameness tonight.

Clark didn't want to think about Bruce. He wanted to avoid all the painful and awkward introspection about what it meant to be jealous of men who had had Bruce in a way Clark had not.

But as much as he wished to avoid that line of thought, he found himself drawn back to it. He wanted to know if he had, for the entire length of his friendship with Bruce, mistaken him as straight.

Bruce, of course, kept close tabs on him. He would know these kinds of things about him, like who he was dating, or who he was thinking about. That knowledge did not make Clark feel any less guilty when he finally sat down and typed "Is Bruce Wayne gay?" into his search bar.

Only the first result addressed his question: a post in a low-traffic gossip blog. The piece read as part conspiracy theory, part thinly-researched term paper, set entirely on the premise that Bruce's “act of hyper masculinity" was a result of him overcompensating for being gay. The only evidence it boasted to back itself up was Bruce's long string of short, failed relationships with women and a testimonial from a woman who had met Bruce Wayne at a party once.

It was clearly woven from pure imagination. Clark chuckled to himself as he read the line where the woman recounted Bruce politely rebuffing her advances. It felt silly to even be pondering this question with such flimsy evidence.

Still, the idea stuck in his head. Clark wondered if there was a chance that the writer could have happened upon the truth in the course of wild speculation.

The sidebar of the blog was splashed with several slideshows of candid shots of Bruce. The headline at the top of each promised scandalous scenarios and racy snapshots. It was all incredibly low effort clickbait and yet Clark clicked anyways.

He was met with photos that were lurid, provocative, and sometimes revealing. It was hard to believe that the Bruce he knew would do any of this.

Of course, Clark knew that what he was looking at was not the real Bruce. It was an outsized expression of the character of Bruce Wayne, an undignified, indecent womanizer. Bruce was behind all of this, orchestrating his own humiliations. He was not drunk in the video of him stumbling in public, tie discarded and shirt unbuttoned; he was not high the photo that showed him sprawled limply on a couch, lids heavy and lips parted.

Still, Clark struggled to reconcile the actions of this man with Bruce. He thought of himself and tried to compare his own double life. But for all the times he had let himself appear hapless, helpless, hopeless, he felt he had never truly lost the soul of himself. Clark Kent stuck just as strongly to his own convictions as Superman did.

Bruce Wayne did not.

That left the question: if everything Clark had seen of Bruce Wayne was an act, where did the man Clark had seen him with fit in?

Clark searched again, but could not find any articles or photographs of Bruce dating men. He could only guess that that meant Bruce deliberate hid that facet of his life. How, Clark could not quite guess, because surely such a story would be worth a good amount of cash to sites like these.

As Clark scrolled through another site, a set of photos caught his eye. They showed Bruce lounging on an empty beach just after sunrise with a woman nearly a decade younger than himself. The caption below gave her name, noting that she was an actress. At the time of the photo, they had been dating for six weeks.

In whatever flight of fancy that had brought the pair here, neither had brought bathing suits. They had stripped down anyways, leaving the young woman in a black bra and panties.

In contrast, Bruce wore white. His undershirt, drenched-through, clung to every ripple of muscle in his chest. Underneath his trousers, which lay discarded somewhere farther up the beach, he wore white boxer-briefs. The water had made them translucent, leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination beyond the rectangle of slightly thicker fabric at the front that only barely managed to preserve his decency.

Clark knew he should not find the pictures this tantalizing. He had seen Bruce naked before, in that hurried, locker room way. However, never before had he been in a position to enjoy the spectacle. Now he had these photos to show all that he had missed in vivid detail.

The Bruce he knew would not miss the presence of a paparazzo. That meant that doubtlessly, Bruce was acting for the camera. As Clark looked over the photo, he picked out all the little clues that showed that this morning at the beach was a performance.

Bruce's pose was casual, hands behind his head and legs loosely apart. But he was still showing off, his biceps flexed and teeth gleaming. It made something turn in Clark's stomach to realize that Bruce knew how good he looked. And, while before that same confidence might have annoyed him, Clark found that he did not mind the show.

The undershirt was only another part of the act. Not only was it incredibly, graphically, tight and wet, it hid a substantial swath of skin from the lens. Clark knew Bruce's chest and back were heavily scarred with marks that could never fully be excused by his favored lies of skiing accidents and polo. Not the gunshot wound below his shoulder blade, nor the series of burns across his chest and stomach.

In the next photo, the woman leaned over Bruce. Though there was a half-smile on his lips, he seemed detached from her, eyes slipping past her face.

Clark clicked to another photo. Sighing, he gave in and sat back in his chair to drink the image in. Here, Bruce had turned to his side, facing away from the camera. The cleft of his ass showed clearly, his boxers serving to outline the form of his body rather than conceal. Clark could follow the curve of his spine all the way down to the swell of his ass. Lower still, his eyes wander over the tapered curve of his muscular thighs, impressed with the amount of skin left bare.

Distractedly, Clark palmed at the front of his jeans, putting pressure on his aching cock. He wasn't sure when he had gotten hard, but his reaction was undeniable.

A sudden rush of disgust overtook him and Clark withdrew his hand. He had gotten hard looking at pictures of Bruce, his closest friend. It felt like he had betrayed him somehow, and not just by prying at a part of his life that he kept so compartmentalized. No, he had looked at Bruce as something other than a friend.

Clark did not dare touch himself again. Instead, he closed his laptop and got up to take a shower.

 ****

For weeks, Clark fooled himself into thinking that Bruce had not noticed any difference in his behavior. On some level, he was aware how absurd this deliberate ignorance was, but still he continued the pretense that nothing had changed.

That fantasy evaporated when Bruce appeared in Metropolis uninvited.

Clark knew who was waiting for him as soon as he emerged from the subway onto the street. The steady heartbeat echoed in his ears as he climbed the stairs to his apartment, volume increasing until it seemed to eclipse all other sound.

Stomach twisted with embarrassed dread, he unlocked the door and stepped inside.

Bruce stood in the center of Clark's living room, his form largely lost in shadow. His cowl rested down around his shoulders, leaving his face bare.

"You could have waited ‘til I was home," Clark suggested, voice light despite the weight in his gut. "Knocked on the door," he offered a smile, an olive branch.

Bruce did not take it. He pinned Clark beneath his ice-blue gaze, making clear that he would not be diverted by any attempt at good humor. Frozen in the entryway, Clark's expression quickly sobered. He swallowed and waited for Bruce's judgement.

"Normally, I wouldn't care why you've stopped speaking to me, but seeing as lives depend on you being able to communicate with me, this needs to stop."

Stepping out of the shadows did nothing to soften Bruce's features. Lines were etched into his face, under his eyes and at the downturned corners of his mouth. He was stretched thin, and only stretched thinner by Clark's absurd little jealous tantrum.

"I'm sorry." Clark crumbled immediately. "This is my problem and I shouldn't take it out on you."

Whatever compassion honest remorse might have earned him with anyone else, it was lost on Bruce. "I think it's clear that you have a problem with me."

Clark brushed past him, unable to meet his eyes. This was what he had been afraid of. Once Bruce caught scent of something, he would never ever let it go. As Batman, and as a teammate, his persistence was valuable and occasionally even admirable. As his friend, that same trait was maddening.

"I'm sure you already have your own ideas what it is." Clark looked blindly out the window, trying to feel out what Bruce already knew.

"I do, but I'll listen to you."

That was discomfitingly generous. Grimacing, Clark barely allowed himself to glance back at him. He could not tell Bruce what was bothering him. He did not dare let him know he had witnessed something so intimate.

"Clark," Bruce stepped towards him, reading him easily. "I do know when this started."

"You do?" Clark heard his own heart thud and hastily tried to hide his anxiety. He turned to face Bruce, uneasily meeting his gaze.

Unblinking, Bruce continued. "You overheard me having sex at the charity gala."

Heat rose to Clark's face. "I didn't mean to. I thought you were-"

"I’m not angry about it," Bruce dismissed him. He paused for a beat, before asking, "Are you going to talk to me, or do you want me to keep fishing?"

"Go ahead." Clark clasped his hands together, knuckles white.

"If I was being charitable, I'd say that you've been avoiding me because you don't know how to broach the subject and you feel guilty for eavesdropping on me."

The "if" caught Clark's attention, a last attempt at diplomacy before Bruce was truly honest with him. "You're never really charitable about this kind of thing," he reminded him, purposely reaching for that brutal honesty.

Bruce did not hold back. Though his voice did not change from its usual smoothness, Clark thought that his eyes seemed somehow harder, pupils glinting obsidian.

"Then I'd say that you're personally offended by the revelation that I sleep with men."

Wincing, Clark looked down at his feet. Perhaps a little bit of both he mused, though he did not dare voice that.

"No, no." Clark shook his head, not because it wasn't true but because he couldn't bear to have Bruce think he was rejecting him. "I'm just-" He couldn't say the word.

Jealous.

He stood there, the poisoned word on the tip of his tongue. And though he wanted to say it, Clark could not see that admission making this situation anything other than worse.

"I can't talk about this." That was cowardly, and Clark knew it. However, evasion felt less shameful than the truth. He turned his back to Bruce, giving him his chance to leave unseen.

For nearly a minute, Bruce hesitated, as if about to speak. Then, with footsteps so light that few humans would hear, he made his way to the window.

****

Foolishly, Clark thought that was the end of it. For the next month, Bruce kept his distance, but Clark expected that. Eventually, he thought he might even get used to it.

However, League business continued to bring them together, even if Bruce might have preferred to keep him at arm's length.

Exhausted beyond even his limits, Clark allowed Bruce to put him up in a hotel on the West Coast one night. He felt guilty about the expense, even more so because it was not his money. However, the battle to keep back an incursion from another dimension had left him weaker than he was willing to admit.

As Clark Kent, he ducked into the room Bruce had booked him. He did not even bother to turn on the lights before he crawled into bed.

 ****

Sometime in the early hours of the morning, Clark found himself awake again. He kept his eyes closed, puzzling fuzzily over what could have awakened him. He was warm and comfortable, head resting on a down pillow. When he stretched his senses outwards, he found only the deep breathing of the sleeping and the scattered voices of the few who remained awake.

He let the soft hum of sound that surrounded him fade as he relaxed back in the bed. It was not until he began to doze that he heard a moan come from the next room, loud enough he did not need enhanced senses to hear it. Jolting awake, Clark gritted his teeth. He knew that sound.

Fists bunched at the edge of his blankets, Clark bit into his lip. At that moment, he hated that he remembered exactly what Bruce sounded like when he moaned in pleasure. He hated that his memory would preserve that forever, that he would never forget that sound.

Glancing at the clock, Clark found it was a little past four. He could leave now and pretend that he wanted to be back in Metropolis early. No one would be any wiser.

Another sound found his ears, quieter than the first. Bruce whined, a sound that was largely lost in his throat. It was needy, half-desperate, though he was clearly trying to restrain himself. In spite of himself, Clark wondered what could cause Bruce to make that sound.

Reluctantly, Clark pushed himself up until he was sitting against the headboard. He knew he shouldn't look, shouldn't try to see just what it was that was Bruce was doing. If he truly respected Bruce as a teammate and a friend, he would leave right now. He would take a walk. He wouldn't look.

His breath caught in his throat when he peered into the next room, his chest suddenly burning hot. There, Clark could see Bruce straddling a man--the same man he had been with in Gotham--on his bed. He held his thighs spread wide as he worked himself down on the man's cock, one hand behind him, the other clenched in the sheets.

His lips were pressed into a thin line and his brow furrowed. He moved all in one smooth, steady motion as he was filled, finally pausing when the length was fully seated inside him. He shifted his weight forwards onto his knees, gasping quietly as the angle changed.

Then, with a swivel of his hips, Bruce lifted himself. His thighs flexed as he moved, taut cords of muscle stretching tight around the man beneath him. He worried at his lip as he set his pace, concentrating on the primal rhythm.

Behind him came an appreciative groan. Bruce smirked and reached back, fingers skidding down the man's abdomen to his hip. "That good?"

Jealousy hit Clark like a punch in the gut, but it could not shake him out of his trance. Instead, the feeling settled in his stomach, churning.

Bruce's hair fell into his eyes as he slid his hand down his own stomach to squeeze at his cock. The shaft was thick and dark, the tip wet with precum. As he touched himself, Bruce let his head fall back, baring the pale column of his throat.

Clark swore under his breath. He was hard. As he watched Bruce work at his cock, he hesitantly pressed his hand against himself. His cock strained against the thin fabric of his boxers. Uncomfortable, he adjusted himself, but that did nothing to assuage the ache.

Sweat shone on Bruce's skin, along his brow and down his throat. His undershirt stuck to his chest, the fabric pulled taut until Clark could see the outline of his nipples.

Reaching up, the man curled thick fingers around Bruce's neck, gripping firmly at the gleaming skin. His grasp was tight enough that Clark heard Bruce's breathing grow shallow, lips parting as he gasped for air. Bruce did not struggle, though Clark was certain that he could best the man in any fight.

Hand still at Bruce's throat, the man pulled Bruce down, onto his back. Bruce tipped his head against the man's chest as his grip tightened. He spread his legs wider, carefully bracing his feet on the knees of the other man.

The new angle allowed the man to slam his cock up into Bruce. He grabbed Bruce by his thighs, lifting his legs and taking control. Held like this, Bruce was completely exposed. Like this, Clark could see the man's cock slide inside his body.

Briefly, Bruce lifted his head to watch the man drill into his ass. He swayed with every thrust, short, sharp gasps spilling from his mouth. Then he let his head fall back, as if the sensation was all too much for him.

Growling, Clark shucked down his boxers and took his cock in his hand. He fisted his shaft tightly, giving up entirely on his attempts at restraint.

In the next room, the man pulled at Bruce's knees, lifting him up off his cock. Bruce moaned as the length left him, his own movements now nearly frantic as he stroked himself.

Letting go of Bruce's legs, the man dipped his hand down. Bruce whimpered as his fingers brushed across his abused hole, then slid inside.  His ass was slick, stretched and gaping slightly.  Shuddering, Bruce came, arching his back against the other man. Clark hissed between his teeth as he watched cum splatter across Bruce's stomach.

God, what he wouldn't give to be able to lick that from his skin.

That image fixed in his mind, Clark shut his eyes. He thought of Bruce panting beneath him, because of him, thighs spread in gorgeous surrender. From the room beyond, he let the sound of Bruce's breathing fill his ears, still ragged from exertion. Clark came, fist pressed against his mouth.

Guilt hit him as soon as he finished. Clark sank back against the headboard, deliberately blocking out all the sound around him as he cleaned himself up.

Clearly, ignoring Bruce wasn't working. While he was not certain that Bruce was trying to force the issue, it seemed foolish not to consider the possibility.

The only solution for that was to give Bruce an answer, to tell him why he had tried to put distance between them. It would have to be the painful truth, because Bruce would see through anything else.

Clark would downplay his feelings of course. He wouldn't tell him that what he had long considered to be platonic love, he now suspected was anything but. Bruce would see that as weakness if he knew. He would see that as a reason to keep Clark at arm's length.

At this point, it seemed optimistic to even consider that Bruce might continue to speak with him, but ruefully, Clark thought, that was hardly any different from their current situation.

Already planning his speech, Clark sank back down into his pillows. He doubted he'd sleep again tonight as strangely wired as he felt, but still he somehow found himself exhausted.

There was a loud thud as something, or more likely someone, slammed against the wall he shared with Bruce.

Frustration abruptly boiling over, Clark pushed himself out of bed and struck the wall back. Sudden, vicious anger poured through him, and when he pulled his hand away, he found the plaster dented. He had just managed to pull himself together, and in an instant Bruce had brought that all crumbling down again.

Briefly, Clark debated shouting at them through the wall. It wouldn't do a thing, except perhaps vent his temper, but maybe that was good enough. He stood, fists clenched, waiting for them to make another sound.

A gunshot tore through the air.

Clark's demeanor changed in an instant. Barely pausing to pull his uniform on, he bolted out of his own room and wrenched at the door next to his. As Clark ran, he checked Bruce's vitals, but did not trust that he was safe until he was inside the suite next door.

The two combatants stood frozen, one in each corner of the sitting room. The man Clark did not recognize stood on the far side of the room, now mostly dressed. He nursed an injured wrist as he glowered at Bruce.

Bruce was close to the door, crouched defensively low. He wore nothing more than a bathrobe taken from the hotel closet. A large red mark was rising on his temple and around his eye socket.

A pistol lay on the floor between them.

Bruce frowned when he saw him, but allowed Clark to intercede. Later, he would be livid, but at this moment Clark simply didn't care. He ground the pistol beneath his heel, crushing the muzzle flat.

The other man swore as Clark approached, but seemed to know better than to try to fight him. He grunted when Clark seized him, digging his fingers bruisingly into his arm.

"I think this is Mr. Wayne's room, so unless he has something to say, I'll escort you out." Twisting at the man's arm, he glanced at Bruce, uncertain if he had interrupted some larger plan.

"Looks like you got lucky, pig," the man sneered at Bruce. Clark felt his temper rise, but Bruce was not so easily baited. Arms crossed, he watched coolly as Clark led the man from his room.

 ****

When he returned, Clark gingerly knocked at the battered door to Bruce's room before stepping inside.

Bruce emerged from the bedroom, tying his robe closed again. His dark hair was tousled and wet, freshly showered. Already, a bruise was flowering deep purple around his eye and onto his brow.

"Are you okay?" Clark started simply, concerned.

Bruce ignored the question. "I don't need you to rescue me from a single man with a gun."

There was the fury Clark had been expecting. He exhaled long and low, trying to gather himself before he asked: "Did you know he was an assassin?"

"Yes."

Of course, Bruce's answer would have been the same, regardless of the truth. There was nothing he struggled with more than admitting that there might have been some oversight, that he might have been wrong.

Through the open doorway, Clark could see the mussed sheets, evidence of Bruce's earlier activities. For all his previous resolve, he was not feeling particularly reconciliatory. "Before you slept with him?"

Bruce pulled his chin towards his chest, eyes glittering dangerously. "Yes."

Clark turned from him, feeling his frustration bubble up again. Fervently, he wished that he had enough sway to tell Bruce that he shouldn't put himself in so much danger and have him actually listen.

"Were you expecting me to hear you?" The question felt wrong as soon as it left his tongue, something self-centered, paranoid, a fear he should never give voice to. But Clark couldn't help himself, he needed to know.

To his credit, Bruce's answer seemed painfully honest. "I knew that it was possible, but I decided I didn't care."

 Clark knew he should have left off there, but now that he had made it so far, he didn't feel like he had much left to lose. "What about the first time? Were you planning for me to see that?"

 "No.”

Clark shut his eyes, forcing all his anger and frustration back. Quietly, he cleared his throat. "Bruce, I need to talk to you."

He waited, his hands twisted up into fists, as Bruce reluctantly sat in an armchair. Bruce leaned into the cushions, one arm draped across the back. As he reclined, he crossed his legs, baring most of his thighs as his robe rode up.

Swallowing, Clark forced himself to hold his gaze as he stood awkwardly before him. He bit at his lip, began to speak, then stopped. The staging of the moment felt wrong.

Cautiously, he stepped closer and seated himself at the edge of the armchair across from Bruce. Clark cleared his throat, wishing that he had his glasses to fidget with. He wanted nothing more than to hide behind the mask of Clark Kent, to give himself distance from the very real panic in stomach.

 Finally, he began. "I know it's none of my business who you sleep with-"

 "Then stay out of it," Bruce cut him off as soon as he started.

"Dammit, Bruce, just let me talk for a minute," Clark snapped, just at the edge of losing his temper. Bruce rolled his eyes, but kept his mouth shut, giving him enough time to start his speech again.

Clark was glad for the anger, as it gave him the courage he needed for his confession. "When you came to talk to me a few weeks back, you were right. I don't like seeing you with other men." Bruce nodded along, bored, eyes fixed on a point several feet to Clark's right.

 Frowning, Clark floundered to voice the more difficult admission. "It makes me jealous."

At that final word, Bruce's attention turned back to him. Hyperaware of his sudden interest in what he was saying, Clark plowed on.

 "I've never felt attracted to a man, not like that. So, I just tried to avoid it. I shouldn't have done that to you. I'm sorry." Clark forced himself to look up at Bruce, trying desperately to work out what his expression meant.

“I understand if you don’t want to forgive me for how I’ve acted these last few weeks, but I do want to keep working with you. I can deal with this on my own. I just thought you deserved to know what was going on."

For a long, anxious moment, Bruce was silent. Eventually, he shifted forwards. "I thought you were homophobic."

"I’m sorry," Clark ducked his head sheepishly. "I can see why. You might have even been a little bit right."

 Cautiously, Bruce unfolded himself from his chair, shoulders settling into a relaxed line. He glanced briefly over his shoulder at the bed, before putting his fingers to his temple. His eyes were hollow, shadowed, a picture of complete exhaustion.

"Clark," Bruce rose and leaned forwards, bridging the gap between them. Extending his arm, he gripped at Clark's shoulder comfortingly. "Go get some rest."

As Clark nodded, he felt some of the horrible weight of guilt lift from him. However, a painful twinge remained in his chest, something he did not quite want to describe.

 They resumed their normal roles. That had been all that Clark had asked for, so he felt selfish for hoping for more. If Bruce had ever wanted him, he would have let him know then, wouldn't he?


	2. Jealous

Clark’s phone buzzed in his pocket. _Weekend plans?_ was the only message.

Clark furrowed his brow, checking and double checking the number before he replied. It was Bruce’s personal number, listed in his contacts as only “B.” _Why?_

_Come by the cave._

Frustratingly, that was the only reply he got. But Clark went anyways, more out of a desire to see Bruce than for any real sense of duty to come at his call.

It was still hours before dusk when Clark descended into the damp of the cave. His eyes adjusted quickly to the gloom of the main chamber, but he did not see Bruce, or indeed anyone else there.

Echoing across the walls, Clark heard a scrape of metal against metal. He flew towards the sound, furrowing his brow as he found Bruce prying at a stripped bolt embedded in the barely recognizable flank of the Batwing.

Chunks of armored plating were missing from the left side, the metal underneath warped and bubbled. It was there that Bruce was working, prying open the crushed door inch by difficult inch, starting with the bolts at the hinges.

Bruce’s coveralls were pulled down to his waist and his undershirt lay discarded on the floor. It was so hot in Gotham that Clark could scarcely blame him. Even in the cave it was warm, where even the smallest change in temperature made the ever-present humidity feel oppressive.

The muscles of Bruce’s shoulders jumped and strained as he wrenched again at the bolt, his pliers skidding with a screech up the shaft. He swore quietly as the pliers lost their grip and swayed back on his heels.

Quietly, Clark touched down behind him. “Need help with that?” he offered, voice just a touch too loud.

Bruce froze in place for a split second, the only visible sign of his surprise. Recovering, he shot a glare over his shoulder at Clark, before returning his attention to the bolt. “No.”

Crossing his arms over his chest, Clark watched him try again. Bruce’s powerful hands squeezed tight on the handles of the pliers, pinching the bolt between its jaws. He yanked at the bolt, and again lost his grip.

Bruce drew a deep breath, as much to compensate for his frustration as his exertion. “Go ahead and ask.”

Obediently, Clark did. “What happened?”

“Firefly. The plating underperformed its heat rating.” Bruce gritted his teeth as he grasped the bolt with the pliers again.

“One of the flaws of field testing,” Clark offered. He reached over Bruce’s shoulder to grab the bolt with his bare fingers. His chest brushed against Bruce’s back, and he felt Bruce start.

Grimacing, Bruce gave a great heave and dragged the bolt free himself. The force set him off balance, and he momentarily leaned into Clark’s chest. Righting himself, he turned to Clark, panting slightly.

Sweat glistened across his chest, shoulders and brow. His hands were smudged with soot, patchy swatches of black smeared over his knuckles, up onto his arms. Curling just under his jaw, Clark caught the telltale red of a burn, bright against his pale skin. Bruce half-grinned, the bolt clutched tight in his hand, a trophy of his stubbornness.

“Here,” Bruce waved him towards the center of the cave, dropping both the mangled bolt and the pliers on a cart along the way.

Clark followed closely as he strode across the great platform at the base of the cave, to the computer.

In a few keystrokes, Bruce brought up a set of satellite photos and leaned back in his chair. Clark squinted at the coordinates noted in the corner. “Antarctica?”

“Have you been there recently?”

Clark shook his head.

The photos showed the broad expanse of a white plain, the surface smooth, other than a line of peaks poking up along a bluff. Bracing himself with one hand on the arm of his chair, Bruce pointed there, to the shadowed area under the bluff. “Have you seen this before?”

Clark leaned in, trying to discern what lay in the shadows. "Can you make it bigger?"

Rolling his eyes, Bruce obliged, expanding until that section of hill covered the entire screen. In the shadows, Clark could see a vague, circular form, but could make out little else, though by the onscreen legend, it appeared to be 50 yards wide.

"What is it?"

Bruce stretched out his legs, his foot briefly brushing against Clark’s. If it had been anyone other than Bruce, Clark would have dismissed it as an accident. But with Bruce, everything had a purpose. He chose not to comment.

"It could be a straggler from Brainiac’s forces.”

Grinning, Clark stopped him. "You don't know and you were hoping I did." He allowed himself to relish the moment, purely for the fact that this was likely as close as Bruce would come to asking for his help, before admitting, "I don’t. Sorry, Bruce."

"Well, whatever it is, it damaged the sensor in that quadrant. I’ll need to repair it.”

Clark looked over his shoulder at the still partially disassembled plane. It quite clearly was not flightworthy. “How are you going to get there?”

Bruce looked down, as if getting up his nerve. “I could take Bruce Wayne’s jet to Argentina and then you could take me the rest of the way.”

“You want me to carry you?” Clark nearly laughed aloud. Scowling, Bruce turned away from him. Clark put his hand to his bare shoulder, but did not force him to turn back. “Really?”

Frowning severely, Bruce met his gaze, as if challenging him to make any more of his proposition. “Yes.”

“I thought you hated that,” Clark teased, gladly refusing to let the matter drop.

“Given the circumstances, you’ll have to do,” Bruce grimaced. “I’ll meet you tomorrow morning.”

**** 

Clark was not half surprised that Bruce had his own address at the southernmost tip of Argentina. The house stood at the edge of the city, a modern two-story construction of glass and metal that stood out from the hillside it perched upon.

Lightly, Clark landed on its balcony. The door stood ajar; Bruce was waiting for him.

Inside, he found Bruce dressed in a thick suit of armor that he had not seen before. Noting his questioning look, Bruce explained: “Experimental environmental suit. I installed the temperature regulation system last week.”

Clark nodded, lacking anything of substance to say.

The final touch to the new suit was a mask slightly different from the familiar cowl. Though it had a similar silhouette, thick, flexible material covered the lower half of his face, including his jaw. “There’s a storm coming up. We’ll need to get in and out quickly.” He paced out onto the balcony, Clark just behind him.

“Okay, can do.” Clark reached out to pull him close. Grudgingly, Bruce followed his lead. “Ready?” Clark asked.

“Are you sure there isn’t some other way to do this?” Bruce grumbled. He stood on Clark’s toes, tucked tightly against his chest with Clark’s arms circled around his waist.

“Do you have a better idea?” Clark smiled warmly at him. They both knew there were few other choices, most impractical. The rest were possibly even more awkward. “There’s always bridal style.”

“Just fly, Kansas,” came Bruce’s familiar growl. Clark wondered if he had cracked a smile beneath the mask.

As soon as Clark left the ground, he swooped up towards the sun, just slow enough to ensure the force was not too much for Bruce. Immediately, he felt Bruce’s hands come up to clutch at his back, as if surprised.

“Alright there?” Clark asked his passenger playfully. He paused in midair, hovering nearly a mile above the coastline.

Bruce, who had until now kept his head to the side, turned towards him. Bodies pressed together, that left them cheek to cheek, Bruce’s mask against his skin. He did not ease up his grip on Clark in embarrassment, as Clark thought he would. His fingers remained low, just above the small of his back. “Just fine,” he replied, and Clark could feel the rumble in his chest when he spoke.

Clark flushed and leaned forwards, propelling them south.

****

“The object was there--” Bruce stretched out his arm, gesturing to the wide plain in front of them, all nestled against a few bare mountain peaks. Clark doubted that Bruce could see even few feet in front of him as the weather picked up, snow blowing thick across the icy surface. However, he trusted Bruce and followed his direction.

Slowly, he descended to the barely sheltered mountainside Bruce had indicated. Taking care to find a stable place to stand in the deep snow, Clark set Bruce down.

“Use your comm if you need to talk.” Bruce’s voice sounded in his ear, smooth and deep. “I’ll leave mine on.”

Clark put his fingers to his comm, switching his line to always on as well. “It doesn’t look like there’s anything on the surface.”

“Could it be under the snow?”

The satellite photos were taken just yesterday, but in this weather it was hardly surprising that any evidence of even a large object could be quickly buried.

“Just a minute.” Bruce drew a small tracker from his belt. For a few seconds, he scanned their surroundings, before announcing, “The sensor’s completely gone.”

Looking through the hard-packed snow and ice that surrounded them, Clark searched for the sensor. There appeared to be nothing at all in the deep snow, neither the domed shape of the mysterious object that had caught Bruce’s eye, nor the smaller sensor that had been anchored in the bedrock. But underneath the snow, Clark could see something else.

“There’s something carved in the rock.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.” Clark could understand his skepticism: on the surface, it was difficult to differentiate this stretch of snowy landscape from anywhere else. But below the many layers of tightly-packed snow, he could see the outline of a shallow crater.

Leaving Bruce to stand at the top of the nearest snowdrift, Clark hovered over the site. Inhaling deeply, he then blew out a great gust of air, which he heated with his vision. A great, towering pillar of steam rose around him, obscuring him from sight.

“Shit,” Bruce hissed under his breath, something Clark was undoubtedly not supposed to hear.

“You okay up there?”

“Fine.” As the steam began to clear, Bruce carefully descended, slowly sliding down the slope of loose and melting snow.

A circle was scored deep in the stone, which shared the dimensions of the object caught in satellite photograph. Many undulating runes were carved around its rim, swirls of more delicately etched marks connecting each in a web near the center.

Bruce paced around the outside of the circle, careful to make sure every mark was recorded by his lenses. He hunkered down against the wind, which was quickly blowing snow back in again. Clark stood behind him, trying to shield him.

Unclipping the replacement sensor from his belt, Bruce popped open the capsule. He knelt in front of a hole drilled at the edge of the circle, where the sensor should have been anchored.

As Clark watched, Bruce struggled for a moment with the wind. Stepping closer, Clark steadied him with his hands on his shoulders. Though he glanced back at Clark, Bruce did not recoil from his touch.

As he closed the capsule again, Bruce looked up, towards the mountainside. The snow was so thick Clark doubted that he could see anything at all. Even he struggled to make out the large, looming shape of the volcanic slope.

“Do you hear anything nearby?” Bruce fiddled with the manual focus on his lenses, before returning his attention to the hole in the rock. Carefully, he slid the sensor inside, before securing it.

Closing his eyes, Clark obediently stretched out to listen to everything beyond them. To his ears, the howl of the wind as it swept around the rock drowned out most other sound. Below that, he strained to hear other, quieter sounds.

Even here, in the distance, he could hear animals. Beyond the soft rustling of the Antarctic creatures, there was the groan of shifting ice as it scraped down its broad path, inch by quarter inch. Though Clark strained to hear a mysterious slide, or hiss, or groan, he could find nothing that seemed strange. Instead, he always found himself drawn back to the beat of Bruce’s heart.

“I can’t hear anything out of the ordinary,” Clark eventually confessed. “If you’re finished, we should go.”

“Alright.” Obligingly, Bruce allowed him to wrap his arms around his waist.

 ****

Clark did not try to speak as he flew back from the frozen continent after he heard the soft click as Bruce turned off his communicator. Bruce seemed tense even as he rested against him, and Clark could not guess why.

Bruce pushed away from him as soon as they touched down on the balcony. Pausing outside, Clark brushed at the ice and snow that had accumulated on his suit. Something about Bruce’s demeanor nagged at him, but for the moment he let it slide.

It took only seconds for Clark to give up entirely on his suit, instead opting to remove his cape and the upper half. The material shed ice all over the balcony as it bunched and stretched, leaving clumps of snow to melt on the decking.

Inside, he hung the still frozen articles over the back of one of the kitchen chairs. Bruce was nowhere to be found. Clark could not quite tell what was on his mind or if it was his place to try to find out.

Unbidden, the memory of Bruce huddled tight against him as he shielded him from the storm returned. Clark let his senses expand outwards. He found Bruce’s heartbeat and the sound of him breathing. Then he paused, because Bruce’s breath was shallow in a way he had not heard before.

“Bruce?” Clark called. No reply came, so he ventured further into the house, making his way towards the bedroom.

Standing at the foot of the bed, Bruce stripped off the mask that had covered his face. All the other pieces of his suit lay around his feet, traces of snow and chunks of ice melting into the carpet. Bruce was left in only his thin undersuit.

The entire undersuit, from his shoulders to his ankles, was soaking wet. The once light grey fabric was dark and clung tight to his body as he clumsily began to pull it off. The skin Clark could see seemed unnaturally pale, barren of the usual flush of life.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes.” Bruce did not look at him.

“Bruce.” Clark frowned impatiently. Carefully, he approached him, skirting the pile of discarded armor.

“I’ll be fine,” Bruce growled. “I just need to get warm.” He reached for the back of the undersuit, fingers fumbling over the zipper.

“Let me,” Clark offered. He reached out, but waited for Bruce to put his hands down in momentary surrender before he touched him.

The long zipper down Bruce’s spine revealed more deathly pale flesh. His skin was cold and damp against Clark’s fingers as he eased the tight sleeves down Bruce’s biceps, then the rest of the suit down his thighs.

Discarding the undersuit on the floor, Clark reached for the waist of the compression shorts he wore underneath. Quickly, he stretched the fabric and tried to pull the shorts down without making too much contact with Bruce’s skin. He steadied Bruce with a hand at his back as he stepped out of the shorts.

“I’ll go get some towels,” Clark told him before he ducked into the adjoining bathroom. He returned with a couple, leaving one on the bed as he unfolded the other.

Clark did his best to keep his touch efficient, impersonal, even as he dried every inch of him. He found Bruce disconcertingly compliant. Hoping both to make this experience less awkward and to get Bruce talking, he asked: “What happened?”

The question seems to animate Bruce, at least for the moment. “The cooling system in the suit burst.” Bruce leaned around him to gesture at the discarded oversuit. “Part of the piping must have been too close to the surface to be insulated properly.”  He seemed to lose the thread of the conversation there, staring at the suit.

“Come here.” Clark ushered Bruce away from the icy mess on the carpet.

He dressed him in clothes he had found in the drawer under the bed. There were boxers, sweatpants, socks. Finally, he found a blanket to wrap around his bare torso as he sat him down on the edge of the bed.

Clark sat beside him, uncertain of what more he should do. He took Bruce’s hand and pressed it between his own, finding it unsettling cold to touch. Tentatively, Clark reached under the blanket he had draped around Bruce’s shoulders. He found Bruce’s stomach just as icy as his fingers had been.

He drew him forwards and Bruce reluctantly followed his lead, crawling up to lie across his body. Gently, Clark folded his arms around him, clasping him tightly against his chest. Bruce kept his head turned stiffly to the side, away from Clark.

Clark rubbed his hands up Bruce’s back in short, firm strokes. Bruce shivered slightly, but gradually relaxed against him. Finally, he leaned forwards, resting his head on Clark’s shoulder.

Clark found his hands hanging limply at his sides. The tips of his fingers still felt cool when he folded his own hands around them. Enclosing Bruce’s left hand in his own, Clark brought his fingers up to his lips to blow warm air across chilled skin.

Bruce lifted his head and turned to face Clark, so close that he could feel the heat of his breath on his cheek. Gently, Bruce put his hand to Clark’s jaw, turning his head towards him.

He kissed him, mouth hot despite the chill remaining in his body. Clark eagerly returned his affections, still rubbing his fingers absently over Bruce’s hand.

Whatever Bruce was thinking now, Clark was certain this wouldn’t continue. However, he intended to make it last as long as he could. Bruce seemed happy to sprawl across his lap, one hand curled greedily around the back of Clark’s neck to keep their mouths together.

That night their kisses were long and languid, not rushing to make progress to any other goal. Slowly, Bruce drifted off, still cradled in his arms.

****

A single band of light spilled through the crack in the blinds, painting a golden stripe from Bruce’s shoulder down to his hip. The section of his skin that lay bare was prickled with gooseflesh. Furrowing his brow, Clark pulled the blankets back up around him.

He wondered briefly if Bruce would object to him kissing him now.

Bruce stirred against him, turning to rest his head on Clark’s chest. He settled there for a moment, long enough that Clark thought he might still be asleep, before cracking his eyes open.

“Did I wake you up?”

“No.” Bruce’s voice rasped as he spoke, thick with exhaustion.

Clark pressed his lips to the top of his head. He combed Bruce’s hair out of his eyes and kissed his forehead, then began a long trail of tiny, worshipful kisses around Bruce’s temple and down onto his cheek. Bruce frowned deeply the whole way, before finally disengaging from him as he reached his stubbled jaw.

Planting his hand firmly on Clark’s shoulder, Bruce righted himself. While still pinning him to the bed, Bruce claimed his mouth.

The kiss carried the unmistakable heat of intention that had been absent last night. Bruce kissed him until he had to break away, panting.

Already, Clark’s cock was aching. He was slightly embarrassed by how little it had taken to get him hard. But when Bruce shifted position, Clark felt his cock dig into his thigh.

Bruce sat up, straddling Clark’s lap. With his hands braced behind him, he leaned back and ground his ass against Clark’s cock. Running his hands down Bruce’s sides, Clark grasped his hips.

The dim half-dark of the shuttered room hid nothing from Clark’s eyes. Scattered across Bruce’s chest he could see all the familiar scars, and a few older marks he had never had time to notice. Just above the place where he gripped Bruce’s hip, an old gunshot wound was marked by a shallow divot in his skin.

Pushing himself onto his elbows, Clark levered himself up. He bent forwards until he could brush his lips against Bruce’s chest. Slowly moving down, he peppered Bruce’s skin with kisses. Bruce inhaled softly when his lips dipped below his ribcage.

His hands slid around the sharp corners of Bruce’s hips to the small of his back. Licking a line across Bruce’s nipple, Clark slipped his hands down the back of his boxers. He cupped his ass, squeezing gently at the warm flesh, before dragging his clothes down his thighs.

Clark glanced up briefly at Bruce after he bared his cock. For the moment, Bruce seemed content to watch. Curling his fingers around his shaft, Clark began to stroke him. Bruce groaned quietly, hands settling on his chest. 

Gently, Bruce pushed him onto his back. Clark yielded easily, letting his head fall back on the pillows. Bruce swiftly worked to pull his sweatpants and boxers off, with Clark lifting his hips up off the bed to help him.

Bruce leaned over him, hands braced over his shoulders. With a sensuous roll of his hips, he began to rut against him. Stretching up, Clark captured his mouth with his own, thrusting his tongue between his lips.

The soft drag of skin against sensitive skin created delightful friction between them. Slowly, Clark felt heat began to build in his belly.

Bruce dipped his hand down between their bodies and rubbed briskly up the swollen length of Clark’s cock. Moaning into Bruce's mouth, Clark ground his cock up into the steady pressure of his palm. “Bruce,” he panted, breaking away to gasp for air he did not need.

After sealing their lips back together, Bruce took both their cocks in his fist. Driving his hips against Bruce’s fingers, Clark found a desperate rhythm. Bruce swore, then bit deep into Clark’s throat as he came.

Eyes intent, Clark watched as Bruce arched his back, hips pressed flush to his. Thrusting a few times more through the growing stickiness between them, Clark whined when Bruce pulled away. “Bruce—”

Bruce took him in his mouth, swallowing him down quickly. “Bruce, Jesus,” Clark barely heard himself babble as he clutched at his hair. “I swear, your mouth—” He came, spilling onto Bruce’s tongue.

Bruce lapped up the last few beads of cum from his cock, pressing a kiss to his shaft. He sat up on his knees, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed. Clark pulled Bruce back down, who seemed happy to collapse against him, and held him there for several long minutes.

Hissing softly between his teeth, Bruce pulled away from him. He frowned a little at the mess that coated their stomachs, before stretching out to find something to clean them up. When he had finished, he returned to curl against Clark’s chest.

As they lay together, Clark put his fingers to Bruce’s lips. There lay another scar, so faded that even Clark could barely find it. It split his lips in a straight line down, so precisely that Clark could not guess what might have caused the mark. Idly, he traced the line, up and down and back again.

Clark lost the trail of the scar when Bruce turned towards him and spoke. “Do you want to know about that scar?”

“Is it okay if I ask about your scars? Do you mind?”

Bruce lay his head on the pillows. “Ask about one.”

Gently, Clark rolled him onto his back. Laid out beneath him, he could see dozens of scars mapped out across Bruce’s skin. Some were exactly what he had expected to find, marks where bullets and knives had torn his skin. Others seemed too terrible to mention, certain to bring awful stories of death and pain. Some of them he even knew and had been present for the initial injury.

So, Clark took Bruce’s right arm and put his fingers to the small scar on the inside of his elbow. It was a little over an inch long and roughly triangular. Clark could not quite guess what could have caused it. “This one,” he said as he gently ran his thumb along it. “How did you get it?”

Bruce contorted his arm to get a better look, before glancing back up at Clark. “That one?”

“Is it a bad memory?”

“No.” Bruce scratched at his chin, expression softening. “I was saving a cat.”

“Out of a tree?” Clark raised his eyebrows, incredulous.

Bruce snorted. “No,” he repeated. “I leave that to the boy scouts.” Tipping his chin up, he smirked at Clark, who promptly kissed the smile off his lips.

****

“Will you tell me something?” Clark asked later, when they made their way into the kitchen.

“Depends on what it is.” Bruce leaned against the counter, one hand curled around his glass.

“Were you attracted to me before I told you I was interested in you?”

Bruce frowned over his orange juice. “It’s too early in the morning for this.”

“Sorry,” Clark apologized, rather than pointing out that it was well past noon.

Still scowling, Bruce set his glass down on the table. “I’ve never really known what was good for me. So, yes. When you first showed up, handsome, powerful and completely insufferable, I was infatuated with you. After we became friends, I tried to put it away. I thought I would drive you away if you knew.”

“And now?” Clark waited for the catch.

“Clark, you deserve—”

“Bruce, don’t,” Clark caught his hand and twined their fingers together. “Don’t try to tell me you aren’t worth it. You’ve waited so long. Can we just try?”

Bruce took a deep breath, thumb tracing over the back of Clark’s hand. “Alright.”

**Author's Note:**

> For anyone a little more curious about this fic's origins, I wrote the first part a while ago as a fill for a DCEU Kinkmeme prompt. However, it has very little to do with the actual prompt (other than Clark angsting over Bruce's sexuality) and isn't even necessarily DCEU, so I gave up on it. 
> 
> I then attempted to expand it into something more suiting the Superbat Big Bang in length. In that, Unnamed OC leads a splinter group of the League of Assassins in an attempt to capture Superman. But I quickly found out that expanding a largely already completed fic into something bigger is incredibly frustrating and involves a lot of rewriting. So, I gave up and started work on "Like a Steel Trap" instead. The "Sweet" scene would have appeared after the current ending.
> 
> Please forgive the fact that some of the seams of all of that fiddling around are showing.
> 
> edit to add: The scar conversation is in reference to one my very favorite Batman scenes from Batman: Year One. In it, Bruce takes down a SWAT team after being shot and losing his utility belt in an explosion. He also saves a cat.


End file.
